Power of the Quest

Day 2, October 7 2008

Welcoming Activity

Question Tickets

• Each participant gets 5 different coloured tickets to hand to someone who asks them a question.
• The person who has the highest number with the widest variety of colours receives a prize
• If its a tie we will have a draw

What is Inquiry Learning?

Building an Inquiry Model (Joanne)

• Last year's model
• Review from yesterday
• Build and tweak as we go
• Four levels of inquiry

How can teachers create a classroom environment that is conducive to inquiry learning?
What can teachers do to develop a Questioning Mindset? What is a Questioning Mindset?

Seeds of Becoming by Dorothy Heathcote

A Questioning Mindset

Activate: (Joanne)
What do our students need to learn?

• Snowball
• Circle Talk (Consultants ideas and comments are integrated into the circle talk - to brought forward in the next activities)

Expand
If we believe that students need to understand deeply and apply knowledge what encourages and develops that in our classrooms?
Strategies for developing a Questioning Mindset
Participants will rotate through 3 stations:

1. Experiential/play - Sherron focuses on how 'different perspective thinking' leads to questions
2. Comprehension strategies - JoAnne Focuses on how the comprehension strategies lead to deeper thinking - and to questions
3. Challenging the 'status quo' or accepted information - Donna focuses on how questioning assumptions leads to more questions

• Students learn to strip away the outer coatings and veneer to see what lies below the surface of the idea. This is what we mean by teaching them to challenge assumptions. First they must identify the assumptions. Then they must see how worthy they are.
  • Do the assumptions stand up to demanding questions?
  • Are the assumptions based on something more than wishful thinking? passionate belief?
  • Is there abundant evidence to bolster the assumptions? From Jamie McKenzie's Challenging Assumptions, June, 08

Apply
What do I believe students need to learn and what do I do that works toward that? Choose one activity.

• Teacher Credo statemetn
• T Chart - 'looks like/ doesn't look like'
• Acronym

Questioning Strategies

Activate

• Q Tasks Workshop and book discussion (Donna)

Expand

• Take participants through 2 - 3 strategies
  • Q Tasks
  • Engaging Readers and Writers in Inquiry by Wilhelm

Apply

• Homework

Reflection
Wiki post - respond to guiding questions

What are Essential Questions and why do we need them?

“The quality of your life depends upon the quality of the questions you ask.” Andrew Kern

Activate
Give partners several essential questions and have them deconstruct them. What characteristics to they have in common?
Expand
Essential Question Jigsaw

1. Sit with a different group (not grade level) and become and expert about the assigned author's perspective
   1. Handout: Selected and adapted from Jamie McKenzie's book Learning to Question, to Wonder, to Learn, his website and and from the Galileo Web Page, Creating Essential Questions.
   2. Enduring Questions
   3. What is an essential question? by Grant Wiggins
2. Move back to grade level and share with your grade alike colleagues
3. Grade groups synthesize/collage into common Essential Question characteristics
4. Report to large group
5. Analyze for commonalities and discuss questions

Apply

1. Speed Activity: Write Essential Question from ELA contexts
   • grab a card (ELA topic)
   • Write as many EQ in one minute as possible - save the best
   • Repeat several times
   • Choose your best - pass it on to another participant
   • Write an answer and analyze it for higher level thinking, opinion, more than one answer, etc...
2. Grade group activity
   • Choose an ELA context and theme/topic
   • Define the essential understandings about the topic
   • Frame an essential question
3. Test the essential question:
   • Analyze each other's against EQ criteria
   • Try to answer it using personal knowledge
   • Jigsaw back to mixed grades and share EQ tweaks

RESOURCES:
Asking Good Questions
Donna's Decicious (online bookmarking) links on Questioning

Closure

1. Reflection
   • Wiki posts
     • Respond to guiding question and to essential question
2. Summary of the two days and a hint of what is yet to come
3. Expectations
   • Question strategies experimentation
   • What will help keep these days in your mind
     • Thinking about essential questions for lessons and units
     • Supports from us
   • Quote for next time we meet